What lurks in Sandy-hit homes? Mold

Email Newsletters

Daily Photo Galleries

Traveling by Jeep, boat and foot, Tribune-Review investigative reporter Carl Prine and photojournalist Justin Merriman covered nearly 2,000 miles over two months along the border with Mexico to report on coyotes — the human traffickers who bring illegal immigrants into the United States. Most are Americans working for money and/or drugs. This series reports how their operations have a major impact on life for residents and the environment along the border — and beyond.

By The Associated Press

Sunday, Feb. 3, 2013, 5:23 p.m.

NEW YORK — Esther Tauscher stood outside her Staten Island home, leafing through boxes of family photos that had been steeped in storm water. She paused to point out life events — her honeymoon, holding her baby boy in a hospital bed.

The photos are just about all she has left. Behind her, the home where she and her family lived for 14 years was being dismantled by a masked volunteer crew that tossed out her possessions and ripped out floorboards and walls.

It was Tauscher's only option. Her house and nearly everything in it was consumed by mold.

“If the water didn't get it, the mold got it,” she said.

Three months since Superstorm Sandy, mold lurks in once-waterlogged buildings, hiding below subflooring, under foundations and in door and window frames. Sometimes it mottles walls in plain sight. And it can make dwellers sick, another blow to people still recovering from the October storm that sent the Atlantic surging into homes in New Jersey and New York.

The right conditions

Mold is flourishing in homes that never completely dried out, where the owners may have waited to make repairs or could not access the house for weeks because of safety concerns. Other flooded homes remain vacant and unheated.

But even some who quickly chucked saturated belongings, ripped out soggy wallboards and carpets and scrubbed walls with cleaners and bleach are still finding mold, because the home didn't fully dry, treatment didn't work or unscrupulous contractors didn't kill it.

“Mold needs two things. It needs food, and it needs moisture,” said Paul Lioy, a professor of environmental medicine at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in Piscataway, N.J. “So if you have places that aren't completely dried out, you're going to have conditions that are ripe for mold growth.”

Mold can spur coughing, wheezing and other reactions in people who are allergic or sensitive to it or have asthma, and can cause infections in people with chronic lung conditions.

In 2004, the Institute of Medicine found “sufficient evidence” of a link between damp, moldy indoor environments and upper respiratory tract symptoms, coughing and wheezing in healthy people, and asthma symptoms in asthmatics.

If mold is treated safely, there should be few health effects, said Dr. Kevin Chatham-Stephens, a pediatrician and environmental health fellow at Mount Sinai Medical Center. But doing it yourself could make things worse. Chatham-Stephens said bleach and other chemicals used to clean mold can cause respiratory irritation.

Costly remediation

Mold remediation can cost as much as $15,000 and require people to leave their homes for days. It is not directly covered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency or New York City's Rapid Repair program, which provides emergency repairs to residents affected by the storm.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Thursday announced a $15 million public-private partnership to remove mold in about 2,000 city homes. The money was raised privately, and the program will be run by a community development nonprofit. It will find homeowners through referrals, with the neediest families receiving priority. The city is holding training sessions on how to deal with mold in the home.

The program was started by the Mayor's Fund to Advance New York City, the Red Cross and the Robin Hood Foundation.

Problem could worsen

Joseph McKellar, executive director of Queens Congregations United for Action, said that the city's program is “a good first step,” but that 2,000 homes is “really only a start.”

McKellar and community leaders formed “Back Home, Back to Work,” an organization that wants to use union members to clean out mold-infested homes in New York. The group is calling for part of the $50.5 billion emergency aid package passed by Congress to be used for mold remediation. Sen. Charles Schumer said he would like to see federal money allocated to fight mold.

Lioy worries the mold problem will only get worse in the spring and summer, when consistently warm temperatures will allow mold to flourish. Even warm days like Wednesday and Thursday, when temperatures reached into the 50s and 60s, can accelerate mold growth.

Richard Schielke scrubbed the salt and mud off his hardwood floors after the storm but discovered weeks later that mold lurked under the floor. He hired a crew from Flag Enterprises, a Lindenhurst, N.Y., restoration services company. Workers scoured his moldy floor and walls and set up large air filters that hummed throughout his home.

“There was no playbook saying, ‘If this happens, this is what you should do,'” Schielke, of Massapequa, N.Y., said.

Alyssa Durnien, of Keansburg, N.J., came back to her damaged house about 15 days after the storm and sprayed a mildew product on the wood and underbelly of her home, which had mold damage.

Months later, the mold is back. Durnien set up dehumidifiers throughout the house and plans to hire a professional.

TribLive commenting policy

You are solely responsible for your comments and by using TribLive.com you agree to our Terms of Service.

We moderate comments. Our goal is to provide substantive commentary for a general readership. By screening submissions, we provide a space where readers can share intelligent and informed commentary that enhances the quality of our news and information.

While most comments will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive, moderating decisions are subjective. We will make them as carefully and consistently as we can. Because of the volume of reader comments, we cannot review individual moderation decisions with readers.

We value thoughtful comments representing a range of views that make their point quickly and politely. We make an effort to protect discussions from repeated comments  either by the same reader or different readers.

We follow the same standards for taste as the daily newspaper. A few things we won't tolerate: personal attacks, obscenity, vulgarity, profanity (including expletives and letters followed by dashes), commercial promotion, impersonations, incoherence, proselytizing and SHOUTING. Don't include URLs to Web sites.

We do not edit comments. They are either approved or deleted. We reserve the right to edit a comment that is quoted or excerpted in an article. In this case, we may fix spelling and punctuation.

We welcome strong opinions and criticism of our work, but we don't want comments to become bogged down with discussions of our policies and we will moderate accordingly.

We appreciate it when readers and people quoted in articles or blog posts point out errors of fact or emphasis and will investigate all assertions. But these suggestions should be sent via e-mail. To avoid distracting other readers, we won't publish comments that suggest a correction. Instead, corrections will be made in a blog post or in an article.

Total Promotional Solutions

A division of Trib Total Media is your one-stop-shop for all of your branded merchandise needs.

We specialize in providing quality affordable promotional products for every type of business including non-profits, schools, universities, sports teams and more. With 1000’s of products to choose from, our knowledgeable staff can help you find the perfect apparel item or product to suit your needs and budget.

Digital Sales

We offer a wide variety of traditional and new digital advertising options customized to fit your needs!

Whether you're just starting out, or you've been a keystone in the community for years, our knowledgeable staff can provide you with a customized package including online banners/advertisements, Social Media Marketing (Facebook / Twitter), Website development, Search Engine Optimization, Email Marketing solutions and much more!

Contact your local sales rep today for details, personalized proposal and a meeting to discuss how we can meet your needs.